


Going down the wolves' den

by Aurum_Ann



Category: Original Work
Genre: Family Feels, Family Fluff, Father-Daughter Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Reader-Insert, This is about magic, like fairies, so I'll have them be magical, updated bi-weekly, wolves are really good to the environment
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-02
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:27:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25039243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aurum_Ann/pseuds/Aurum_Ann
Summary: This story starts with your birthday. You receive a message from your long-gone father and set out to meet him. It turns out the world has a lot more magic than you thought, but you find that evil can hide everywhere.What will you choose? Loyalty to your family or loyalty to your morals? Comfortable silence or cold hard truth?Written in second-person, reader-centric.First time writing in second-person.
Relationships: Reader's father & Reader
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	1. Way up in the sky, there's a land of magic and all of those who make their way up there-

You wake up slowly, savouring the soft blankets that surround you. Through the door, that is slightly ajar, come excited voices. You recognize your grandma’s voice and the loud blabbering that could only mean Lou and her family came as well. Your mouth curves into a slow, sleepy smile. It is your birthday!

Through the sleepiness, you manage to make yourself sit up.

Getting up, stretching until you hear the pops, jumping up and down in place for a few seconds, you get ready for the day.

The room you are in is not yours, per se. It is old and smells of books and closed spaces. It is only yours when you come to sleep there, in your grandma’s house. You like it. There is a big window facing the backyard and, beyond the fence, the forest. The walls are made of stone. There is a bookshelf under the window, but the only books there are alphabet-and-numbers picture books and an old children’s bible. The wood is dark, and you can see a name scratched onto it, with ugly wobbly letters, **_N_ ATHA _N_**. You know it was your father’s name. It was your father’s room.

You like it there.

You never met him, he disappeared when you were a baby, a little bit after you learnt how to walk. You know that, because your mother has a video of him, on his knees, holding out his hands to baby-you, prompting you to walk to him. You go, awkward and uncertain, and almost fall once. He hugs you tight in the video and spins with you in his arms.

Nobody knows why he never came back.

Nobody knows how he went away, either.

You like to think he loved you.

A knock on the door startles you away from the bookshelf and that name full of memories. You realise that you had walked closer to it, while you were thinking, and your face is almost touching the window’s glass when you stand.

«Morning, sweetheart. » your mother’s voice slithers in. Her voice is sweet like sugar and comforting like a hug. «We are about to have breakfast. Are you ready? »

Your face stretches into a smile. Birthday breakfasts like these are your favourite part of the day.

Okay, not true, you love every part of your birthday.

«I am. »

The two of you go to the kitchen together, mother’s arm around your shoulders, her hand squeezing your arm, lovingly.

In the kitchen, already sitting around the table, are your Grandma, Aunt Rose, Uncle Al, Lou – your favourite cousin and your best friend, and your younger cousins Judith and Matt. They smile as soon as they see you and get up to sing/scream out the birthday song.

You sing along.

The rest of the morning goes just how you like it. There is a lot of playing involved, and you get to run outside and wet the hem of your pants with the dampness of the grass. Lunch was a-mazing and there was pudding for dessert!

Then, as your aunt took the young twins up for their nap, your grandma came and asked you to follow her into your room.

«Now, Sky, I have something to give you. » She said, sitting down on the bed and patting the blanket beside her to call you closer.

You obey, surprised. The food and all the sweets are all she gifts you on your birthdays, and they are more than enough. What could it possibly be?

«What is it, grandma? »

She smiles, «When your father was your age… When he was your age, he wrote this short story, about wolves and magic… He was very imaginative! He never did finish it, though… »

When she reaches behind her, you notice the object she had. It was a small notebook; red card covers and yellowed pages. When she gives it to you, you see someone glued a piece of paper to the front cover. It read:

**THE WOLVES UP I _N_ THE MAGIC LA _N_ D**

**UP I _N_ THE CLOUDS**

Your eyes slide over the letters you have come to recognize. The broken N. All capitals, like a constant scream. Didn’t your mother once say your dad was the noisy kind?

«Thank you, grandma. » You smile at her.

She leaves without another word.

You begin to read the story.

**I CLIMBED THE TREE TO REACH THE TOP, BUT THE TREE KEPT ON GOI _N_ G UP A _N_ D UP. I TRIED TO GIVE UP, BUT I COUL _N_ ’T SEE THE GROU _N_ D A _N_ YMORE, OR THE HOUSE, OR THE CITY. SO, I CLIMBED SOME MORE. FI _N_ ALLY, I WAS UP I _N_ THE CLOUDS, A _N_ D THE _N_ , I WE _N_ T EVE _N_ HIGHER. I THOUGHT ABOUT WHAT MY TEACHER SAID ABOUT THE SPACE, ABOUT THE OXIGE _N_ A _N_ D THE VACUUM. I WONDERED IF I WOULD STOP BREATHI _N_ G. MAYBE I COULD MEET A _N_ ALIE _N_.**

**BUT THAT DID _N_ ’T HAPPE _N_. WHAT HAPPE _N_ ED IS THAT I FELL O _N_ A CLOUD, A _N_ D IT HELD ME, A _N_ D IT HAD GRASS GROWI _N_ G O _N_ IT, LIKE BEA _N_ S I _N_ COTTO _N_.**

“Grandma was right,” you thought, “My dad was _very_ imaginative.”

**I STOOD UP, A _N_ D WALKED O _N_ IT, A _N_ D THE MORE I WALKED THE MORE PLA _N_ TS I COULD SEE, U _N_ TIL I STOOD I _N_ THE MIDDLE OF A VALLEY, WITH GREE _N_ BUSHES A _N_ D ALL. I COULD ALMOST FORGET I WAS _N_ ’T O _N_ EARTH.**

**EVERYTHI _N_ G WAS BEAUTIFUL A _N_ D I WAS E _N_ CHA _N_ TED. I STAYED THERE U _N_ TIL _N_ IGHT, A _N_ D THE STARS WERE SO BRIGHT – I COULD SEE SO MA _N_ Y STARS, LIKE I HAD _N_ EVER SEE _N_ BEFORE. I FELL ASLEEP.**

**WHE _N_ I WOKE UP, I WAS SURROUNDED BY GIGA _N_ TIC GRAY WOLVES.**

**_N_ OT ALL OF THEM WERE GRAY, I FOU _N_ D OUT LATER, BUT THOSE WERE.**

**THEY TALKED TO ME A _N_ D I U _N_ DERSTOOD WHAT THEY SAID.**

“His writing is a bit childish, though…”

As childish as it was, it had been written by your father, and you wanted to get to know him more than anything in the world. You lay down on your bed and kept on reading, trying to memorise every word.


	2. -can be one with nature, one with the wolves, and the touch the blue soul of stone hearts.

By the time your grandma called the children to play outside, half of the book had already been read. So far, it was about this boy and how he entered the magic land of wolves. They could make trees grow and flowers bloom, all sorts of nature magic. The boy could understand them and talk to them just fine, and he also learnt how to playfight like the pups. Your grandma interrupted your reading right when he was being told off by the leader of the pack for going out of their cave on his own, because there was a hunter who would love to hurt him and the other pups.

All in all, it was a nice story.

Your grandma’s mango ice cream was better, though, and you didn’t think twice before closing the notebook and running to the backyard.

«How is your day going, birthday girl? » your mother asks, holding your shoulder.

You smile big and tell her how you feel through a tight hug. You like listening to her ‘oof’ as you squeeze her waist.

She kisses your head and lets you go.

Lou and the twins Judith and Matt were already eating their ice creams when you joined them on the grass.

“This is the best mango ice cream I’ve had in my life!” you lick the spoon clean, sighing.

«Hey, Sky, let’s climb! » Matt grins at you, mouth all sticky with cream, «Mum said we can’t climb without you and Lou! »

Lou raises her eyebrows at you, silently enjoying the fact that you were declared the twins’ babysitter as well.

You decide to make it fun for the little kids and race them to the big, ancient trees, a bit further away from the kitchen door where the adults were standing. When you get to the biggest tree, Judith gasps and bends down to pick something from the ground.

«Look, Sky! » she hands you a balled-up paper.

You feel curious, so you open it, untwisting all the wrinkles. On the paper, you find some words, but they are so scratchy that it is hard for you to read. Luckily, Lou comes to your side and deciphers the message.

«It says, “They are many”, then it says something about hunters… and I think the last line is something like, “find the blue stone cave”? »

You can’t help but remember the story you were reading not even twenty minutes before, when you hear about hunters. Was it a prank? Your grandma knew about the story… but she wouldn’t do that.

«This is the ugliest calligraphy I’ve seen in my life. » Lou says, turning back to the tree and starting to climb.

«It sure is. » you agree, giving one last look to the strange letter and pocketing it. It wasn’t anything important, anyway. It could have come with the wind, some people throw trash out of their cars when travelling by, sometimes.

It is fun, climbing trees. At grandma’s, it is a must. One does not simply go to grandma’s and _not_ climb trees. Because she believes children belong out in gardens and yards, touching nature, walking barefoot. But also because it feels good. Freeing. You love to go so high you can see the whole yard, maybe even a bit of the city, and imagine you are at the top of the world. It is the best feeling!

That is why now you try to reach the top of the tree you chose, the oldest tree in the backyard. Your grandma has told you countless times that is was planted by mother nature herself. You do not know if it is true, probably not, but it _is_ impressive. The twins are not allowed near it, and even Lou keeps away from it. She says it is scary. It is your favourite tree, though. It is special. Somehow, it feels special.

Trying to reach the top, you hum a melody under your breath. Your mind focuses on finding the best footrests, the best places to hold. That one to your right is not good, you know, because it is not that wide. You do not trust that branch to your left, because it cracked once, and even though it was fixed and grew over the crack, you avoid it.

Before long, you start to feel your hands sting a bit because of so much friction against the bark. You look up, trying to see the top, and it does not look that far away, which is good. You had not expected it to take so much time and you would like your hands not to be hurt.

Climbing is rhythmical, you think. Hand, foot, hand, foot, on and on. It is like a little dance. It could be a _pas de deux_ where the tree was your partner, except trees do not move. But imagine if they _could_ dance…

Laughing at yourself, and creating even weirder imaginative scenarios, you do not notice the silence that surrounds you, the absence of voices. Instead there is the wind. But in your head, none of that goes noticed because, imagine a hip hop dancer tree!

It is not until the stinging you felt on your hands becomes real pain that you take a good look at them. And, wow, they are really red. Your heart begins to beat a little bit faster in your chest and, have you been breathing this fast all this time? You should not be so tired before even reaching the top of this tree; It is not even _that_ high!

You turn your face up to search for the top again, and- It is just the same as the last time! It is like you have not moved at all! Just to make sure, you hold on tight and look down.

“Holly father!” You hold a scream. You are too high, so high you cannot see your family anymore. You can, however, see your grandma’s house, and almost all the other houses around it, save for the ones that are behind the branches that surround you.

You want to get down, you aren’t having fun anymore, but while you love climbing up trees, going back down is not so fun and way more dangerous; You get a little bit clumsier when climbing down. You want to scream for help but realise, with a pang of panic, that no one will hear you, no matter how loud you scream.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (•_•)  
> ( •_•)>⌐■-■  
> (⌐■_■)  
> It is so hard to get started, but once I've began, writing is like breathing, and it feels so good.


End file.
